Catastrophic Injury Claims

Catastrophic Injuries – A catastrophic injury is an injury that is caused by any sudden event that leads to great loss or suffering. Such an injury impacts the victim both physically and emotionally and prevents the person from doing any day to day activities permanently or for a long term. However, such an injury does not necessarily lead to fatality. Catastrophic injuries impart more stress on the injured person's family because for their constant supervision needed for the rest of their lives along with lifetime medical bills.

Catastrophic Injury Overview

The situations that lead to catastrophic injuries could be due to negligence or personal enmity or due to defective product etc. The examples of catastrophic injuries could be that a stunt man getting injured when jumping from a building, or a sports person is intentionally given a dangerous or defective equipment to play by the conniving colleague.

The injury caused to the victim is not just limited to a head injury or spinal cord injury. It can be sometimes permanent loss of internal or external organ, multiple bone fractures, burn injuries etc. Another fair point to note is that such an injury is not just personal but it also affects the whole family and their loved ones.

If the victim is the sole earning member in the family and his family consists of children who are still in school and his wife is a non earning member, then one can make out how tough it will be for his wife to earn as much as him in such a short span of time, pay for medical expenses, pay loan and rent, pay for the school, give personal attention to him and for the children. The wife also has to bear the stress in the family caused by the depression that the victim undergoes. Such a chaotic situation will be there for a lifetime.

Looking at the time to bring the family back to near normalcy, the claim involved is usually very huge.

Catastrophic Injury law

There will be several complications legally when going for such compensations. First to determine that the injury is of catastrophic nature itself is very complicated. One need not be a survivor being involved in a head-on collision with a vehicle in order to be called a catastrophic victim. Even a simple slip on a wet floor can cause enough damage to be termed as catastrophic if the fall affects his or her central nervous system sufficient enough to cause partial paralysis and the recovery is long term.

The person or the company to hold responsible may be at times very difficult and hence the delay in claim. It is tough to find out how much of compensation to claim in case of catastrophic injuries.

It will be tough to find a legal practitioner with domain knowledge related to type of catastrophic injury. For example, a lawyer with experience in catastrophic and burn injury should be approached if the victim is involved in a severe life debilitating burn injury.

Examples of catastrophic injuries

Catastrophic injuries mostly happen while playing sports and working in factories or construction sites. There should be general awareness of the law for all who are in and around the victim.

One such real case that comes to thought is when a factory worker puts his hand accidentally into a machine and three of his fingers are dismembered. The co-workers take him to hospital immediately. His supervisor informs the manager who is at a different location about the incident. When the manager comes to the accident spot, he is shocked to find the fingers at the accident spot. It has been hours since the fingers have been lying in the accident spot.

The manager quickly asks the supervisor if he is aware that the fingers can be joined back if proper medical attention is given.

The supervisor replies “yes” and he is aware about it. But replies that it may be required as a part of claim process to show that the fingers were chopped at the accident spot. The factory worker could no longer work and do his normal activities. He required his family members besides him to do day to day work. It was catastrophic in nature.

Analysis

Now when you analyze the case, the catastrophic nature could have been averted if: The worker had enough precautionary measures to run the machine. Also the helpful coworkers had enough knowledge on various kinds of injuries and claims.

Precautions for Catastrophic Injuries

Similarly, when going for any outdoor sports, enough precaution should be taken. If a person is taking up the sport newly, he or she should be accompanied by a coach or practitioner. The person also must be aware of various injuries that may be caused in case of mishap or faulty equipment.

Before taking up any dangerous sport activity such as bungee jumping horse riding etc., it is important to read the fine lines of disclaimer before signing it.

Also, while in office or in store, watch out for sign boards. Even a simple wet floor sign should not be overlooked or ignored.

Catastrophic Injury Claims

Activities while in workplace are also considered when a claim is done. In one such real life example, a factory worker doing night shift was bitten by a dog. His place of injury was surprisingly his nose. When he claimed for the injury, the panel sat and analyzed how the mishap could have happened? The panel after several rounds of interrogation found out that the worker was sleeping while he was at work. A dog would have bitten the leg had the worker was in standing position. Had the dog pounced and bitten the nose of the worker, there should have been marks of struggle. In the absence of any such mark, it was concluded that the worker was sleeping at work and hence the claim was rejected. Though the claim was not catastrophic in nature physically but it had a huge emotional impact on the worker from doing normal work for long period of time.

Thus if you, or your family member, or any of your loved ones is suffering from catastrophic injuries in Dublin as the because of another person's negligence, it is better to have legal representation done by experienced attorney/lawyer to get enough compensation.